Motorized shopping cart
Encyclopedia
A motorized shopping cart (also known as electric shopping cart) is a shopping cart
Shopping cart
A shopping cart is a cart supplied by a shop, especially supermarkets, for use by customers inside the shop for transport of merchandise to the check-out counter during shopping...

 equipped with an electric motor
Electric motor
An electric motor converts electrical energy into mechanical energy.Most electric motors operate through the interaction of magnetic fields and current-carrying conductors to generate force...

 and navigational controls. It includes a seat (oftentimes equipped with an occupant seat switch activating movement of the motorized shopping cart from the occupant's weight) thereby also making it a motorized wheelchair
Motorized wheelchair
A motorized wheelchair, powerchair, electric wheelchair or electric-powered wheelchair is a wheelchair that is propelled by means of an electric motor rather than manual power...

, and it has a rechargeable battery
Rechargeable battery
A rechargeable battery or storage battery is a group of one or more electrochemical cells. They are known as secondary cells because their electrochemical reactions are electrically reversible. Rechargeable batteries come in many different shapes and sizes, ranging anything from a button cell to...

 that can be charged by plugging in the device when not in use in order to maximize usage. Motorized shopping carts are provided by supermarket
Supermarket
A supermarket, a form of grocery store, is a self-service store offering a wide variety of food and household merchandise, organized into departments...

s and other large retail stores for those with permanent or temporary physical disabilities
Physical disability
A physical disability is any impairment which limits the physical function of one or more limbs or fine or gross motor ability. Other physical disabilities include impairments which limit other facets of daily living, such as respiratory disorders and epilepsy....

 who may have difficulty walking through a large store or pushing a regular cart.

The first motorized shopping carts were manufactured by Amigo Mobility International Inc
Amigo Mobility International Inc
Amigo Mobility International Inc, founded by Allan R. Thieme in 1968, changed the mobility industry by inventing the first power operated vehicle/scooter . Located in Bridgeport, Mich., the company manufactures multiple lines of products for healthcare, commercial, transportation services and...

, in Bridgeport, Mich. Fred Meijer was the first retailer to introduce motorized shopping carts in his Flint, Mich. Meijer location in 1970. Since then, multiple manufacturers have developed these products for those with walking difficulties worldwide.

Sage Industries in Arkansas
Arkansas
Arkansas is a state located in the southern region of the United States. Its name is an Algonquian name of the Quapaw Indians. Arkansas shares borders with six states , and its eastern border is largely defined by the Mississippi River...

 introduced their product in Klein's Supermarket in Tomball, Texas
Tomball, Texas
Tomball is a city in Harris county in the U.S. state of Texas, a part of the Houston metropolitan area. The population was 9,089 at the 2000 census. In 1907, the community of Peck was renamed Tomball. The city are named for local congressman Thomas Henry Ball, who had a major role in the...

 in 1985. They have since expanded to numerous other stores around the world and benefited many with various disabilities and even pregnant women.

Many of the customers who use motorized shopping carts are not full-time wheelchair users, but find shopping easier using the device since a regular cart may be harder to push, especially when filled with merchandise, and walking through a large store may be cumbersome for one who is able to walk only short distances on their own power.

Theft

While shopping cart theft has also been a costly matter for retailers, the higher cost of the motorized carts makes their theft a greater issue to the store, and thereby leads stores to establish policies prohibiting the carts from exiting stores, even though a disabled person may have the need to bring the cart all the way to their vehicle.

In May 2009, a Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...

 man was charged with felony
Felony
A felony is a serious crime in the common law countries. The term originates from English common law where felonies were originally crimes which involved the confiscation of a convicted person's land and goods; other crimes were called misdemeanors...

 theft of a motorized cart due to its $2500 value. He was caught not far from the store, riding the cart. Had a non-electric cart been stolen, the theft would have been a misdemeanor
Misdemeanor
A misdemeanor is a "lesser" criminal act in many common law legal systems. Misdemeanors are generally punished much less severely than felonies, but theoretically more so than administrative infractions and regulatory offences...

.

In the same month, two South Carolina
South Carolina
South Carolina is a state in the Deep South of the United States that borders Georgia to the south, North Carolina to the north, and the Atlantic Ocean to the east. Originally part of the Province of Carolina, the Province of South Carolina was one of the 13 colonies that declared independence...

 men were charged with the theft of a cart, and likewise faced felony charges due to it being valued at over $2000.

Injuries

There has been concern over the carts leading to injuries when used by those who do not know how to control them well. The injuries can occur to the user if s/he crashes into an object with the cart, or to a person the user crashes into. To reduce the risk of injury, most carts have a back-up warning system similar to those found on trucks.

In Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

 in 2008, a $50,000 lawsuit was filed by a woman who was hit by a cart steered by an employee of a supermarket. The woman claimed she sustained hip injuries as a result.

Permission to use

While these carts are generally reserved for the disabled, most stores will take one's word for being a disabled person and will not challenge one's need for a cart. But there have been some cases reported in which a person with a non-visible disability has requested the use of a motorized cart, but has been denied the use by store employees who do not believe the customer has a disability.

There has also been concern over minors using the carts. In January 2009, a Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...

 store in Tennessee
Tennessee
Tennessee is a U.S. state located in the Southeastern United States. It has a population of 6,346,105, making it the nation's 17th-largest state by population, and covers , making it the 36th-largest by total land area...

 did not allow an 11-year-old girl with a broken leg to use a motorized cart, despite the fact that she had been allowed by other stores to use them.

Also of concern is who should have priority in using the cart. In August 2009, a 28-year-old man was charged with battery
Battery (crime)
Battery is a criminal offense involving unlawful physical contact, distinct from assault which is the fear of such contact.In the United States, criminal battery, or simply battery, is the use of force against another, resulting in harmful or offensive contact...

 when he pushed an 86-year-old man out of a motorized cart when he allegedly took a motorized cart that the 28-year-old's mother was using..

In popular culture

  • In the Kevin James comedy Paul Blart: Mall Cop, a man is pulled over for speeding on an motorized shopping cart.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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